Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank our guests for coming before the committee today. I really appreciate the opening statements and we will get straight into it. Obviously, the committee is holding these hearings on our request to try to assist the homeowners in terms of the plight they are going through. Some of what they have heard in the opening statements will annoy them. I refer in particular to the points from Mr. Rafferty regarding 100% redress and that the scheme seems to be working or that the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, is satisfied with the progress being made. I acknowledge they are not his words but those of the Minister and that he is an official in the Department but I can tell him the 1,300 people who turned up in Inishowen were not satisfied with the progress.

I am reading through countless emails here to go back over them again. There are different examples of how the scheme does not work for people and how it is not 100% redress. Because if it was 100% redress, they would not be complaining. There are surely red tape and bureaucracy issues in this regard but the biggest issue is that many homeowners do not have the money to demolish and rebuild their homes.

What prompted this was that seven months ago, the BPFI made a proposal to the Department of housing that offered a zero interest loan to homeowners regardless of whether they had a current account or mortgage with the bank. This was on the basis that the State would guarantee the loan. It would be returned to the bank during the first drawdown of the payment to help get them off the ground. This issue speaks to the frustration of homeowners in my county and across the State. I have put in a freedom of information request and I have seen the correspondence from the BPFI where they are telling the Department about the mental health issues, the anxiety of people affected and that a decision was needed.

Last week, we had the BPFI sitting where the witnesses are sitting today, and its representatives said seven months on, they still do not know if this scheme is a runner or not. They have received no formal response from the Department and I think that is terrible. It has been seven months. I have raised this numerous time in the Dáil. I have raised it through parliamentary questions. I made the point that this is not the be-all and end-all. This will only assist a number of families. For many, it still does not deal with the core issue but one way or another, there should have been a decision on this.

When the BPFI brought me in and told me what it was planning, I told it that to tell the truth, it did not really make much sense as the Department should provide the grant upfront. When the Department of Finance was asked for its views in this regard, one of its responses was that the Department of housing should provide the grant upfront as opposed to going through the legislative process of having to guarantee the BPFI. That was months ago. The Department of Finance gave that response last year. Can I ask the Department today whether this proposal is off the table? When does it intend to tell the BPFI that it is either off the table or not?